Actor Mark Ruffalo took a break from playing a superhero on screen to honor a handful of real life heroes in Atlanta as part of The Solutions Project’s new ATL100 campaign. The goal of the campaign is to highlight the local heroes that are helping Atlanta reach its commitment to run on 100% renewable energy sources by 2035, a task that 26 other cities have committed to as well.

Ruffalo is one of the co-founders of The Solutions Project, and he showed up to the Plaza Theatre to honor five nominees who are making a difference in Atlanta. They include ECO-Action Executive Director Dr. Yomi Noibi, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy Campaign Director Amelia Shenstone, Southface Energy Institute Program Manager Shan Arora, Fulton Atlanta Community Action Authority President and CEO Dr. Joyce Dorsey, and Georgia WAND Executive Director Becky Rafter. Together they’re helping bring Atlanta one step closer to its goal of running on 100% renewable energy sources. After playing a surprise video from Ruffalo and his Avengers costar Chris Evans announcing the nominees, he presented them each with portraits of themselves immortalized as illustrated superheroes.

It was great to be around so many people who are passionate about leading the charge to make Atlanta a clean energy city. Their passion is contagious, and it will hopefully drive others to join the cause.

“I’m an actor for a day job. This is what I love,” Ruffalo said about supporting The Solution Project’s clean energy campaign in a passionate and heartfelt speech. “We can do amazing things. We have the technology to do it. The wind is in our sails, economically, and it just takes us going out to the world and telling everybody the good news. And the good news is we don’t need fossil fools any more.”

Atlanta has always been my city and my home. Why shouldn’t we strive to make our cities and our homes the best they can be? 2035 may seem like a long way off but we have a ways to go before we reach 100%. Every little action you do helps, so to join the cause and find out what you can do to make Atlanta or your city a better place because of clean energy, please visit thesolutionsproject.org and 100.org.